Gratitude
by OrangeSea
Summary: Not every freak needs to choose between fighting for good or evil. Nicole is just a kid who knows when to be grateful for the kindness of strangers.


Title was given to me by Byn because I couldn't think of anything better than "I should be shot for writing this" Haha. Thank's Byn, you're awesome!

I don't own the Titans. Just playin' in the playground.

* * *

The young woman stared up at the imposing figure in black. He was famous. Or infamous, depending on who you asked. He had also just saved her ass from the most surreal experience of her life.

She had known during her time in captivity that her life would never be the same again. Her features were now distorted and inhuman and she would never fit in with normal people again. Not that she had fit in particularly well to begin with, but her recent changes were going to make it even more impossible.

She understood that before her was the only man that could possibly help her regain some semblance of a life. The only person that knew what she had been through recently, and hopefully understood her current position.

The girl squared her shoulders and vowed to approach him with dignity. She had to be an adult now, the circumstances demanded it. She took a small step towards the imposing figure. Then another...

"OH PLEASE, YOU HAVE TO TAKE ME WITH YOU." She crumpled at his feet and sniffled pitifully, "GOD, please. Please please please. I have nowhere to go and... and..." She hiccuped. Snot was dripping down her face and tears had wet her cheeks. "I don't know what to dooooooo." So much for dignity.

* * *

The tower unnaturally quiet, considering everybody was home. Robin had just informed the other Titans that they were going to be getting a visiter. He had looked grim as he gave them the brief background of information he had recieved.

"Batman said he found her in a testing facility. Some crackpot had collected a few kids and was planning to alter their DNA to make some sort of super human species. He hadn't gotten far, none of the other kids were changed but she wasn't as lucky. She must have been his first attempt. He says you can still tell she's supposed to be human, but that we should try to make her feel at home here."

Starfire looked mortified, Cyborg and Beast Boy exchanged looks of pity and disgust. Raven just quirked a brow.

"We will give her the heated welcome, then! We must let this poor girl know that friendship is available to her." Starfire looked around as though trying to find physical proof of the friendship she could offer the stranger.

Raven glowered. "Robin, we cannot have another..." She stopped herself and glanced sidelong at Beast Boy who looked uncharacteristically serious.

"Another Terra, I know." Beast Boy crossed his arms across his chest, as though bracing himself for the worst. Cyborg nodded his agreement, but before he could add anything the tower notified them of an arrival.

* * *

It was cold out. Not cold enough to warrant oversized mittens, an enormous hat with earflaps, and the scarf that wrapped around her face so many times you could barely see her eyes, but that didn't stop her. She stood at the base of the tower, shuffling awkwardly from foot to foot as she waited to meet the unfortunate souls that she was being dumped on.

The door slid open and there the Titans. Her knees began to shake, despite the warm clothing. These people were famous, what the hell was she doing here like she actually belonged? She stepped into the Tower when invited in and hovered awkwardly near the door.

"Um. Hi." Her greeting was muffled by the oversized scarf.

"Greetings Friend!" Starfire zoomed towards her and smiled expectantly. "Welcome to our home!" With a grand flourish Starfire encompassed the tower. It was pretty impressive for the house of five teenagers. Super teenagers, the girl reminded herself with no little amount of dread.

"What is your name, friend?"

"Um. Nicole." Came the muffled reply.

Beast Boy spoke up next, "Hey you wanna put your stuff in the closet?" He indicated the strangest closet Nicole had ever seen. It was completely barren with the exception of capes. Mostly black capes but there were a few of some outlandish color or another that probably harkened back to outdated costumes. Nicole shuffled her feet awkwardly.

"Oh, no thanks, um. I get cold easy?" She asked the statement, which made it less than convincing. The titans seemed to excange a mutual look that said something like "Great, she's crazy too." and Nicole attempted to head straight back out the door. A hand on her shoulder stopped her.

"You don't have to be afraid to show your face to us. We know what different is like." Robin's voice was calm, collected, and reassuring. Nicole cursed him silently and sighed outwardly.

"Fine. You have only yourself to blame." She began to unwind the scarf and slipped off her hat, revealing her altered features to the other teens.

Raven did not respond in the least, merely looked at Nicole with indifference. Robin kept his own reaction as neutral with the mere extention of his eyebrow. Cyborg stiffled what may have been a snort, and Beast Boy's grin stretched on for a mile. Starfire nearly exploded.

"You are SOOOO CUUUUUTE!" She squeeled and lifted Nicole into the air to swing around in a circle.

Nicole's exposed features were feline, there was no doubt. Her ears had stretched upwards and become cone shaped, they flattened with surprise at being flung around in the air. Her eyes were green/yellow with slit pupils and her nose had flattened and changed color at the tip. Her lips had thinned and her canines had grown to sharp points.

She had no idea how to respond to Starfires outburst, so instead she fiddled with putting her stuff in the closet after she was returned to the ground. She tugged off her gloves to reveal clawed fingers and the tawny fuzz that covered her entire body now.

Robin appeared to have trouble keeping a straight face. "You... don't look how we expected." He spoke for the team. Nicole didn't doubt him, Cyborg seemed to have found something interesting about his electronic arm to poke at but she could tell his shoulders were shaking with surpessed mirth. Beast Boy flashed her a hundred watt smile. Raven alone appeared indifferent to Nicole's 'disfigurement'.

"Yes! You are most adorable!" Starfire beamed. Nicole forced a smile and nodded.

"I know, I know. I'm really lucky about that, but... I'd rather look normal." She shrugged, unsure what to add.

* * *

The next few months were utter hell. Nicole forced herself into training every moment she wasn't either eating or sleeping. If it wasn't running, it was weight lifting or stretching or some other horrifyingly torturous activity that was designed to better her new freak body. She almost never saw Raven, who didn't often use the gym. Beast Boy and Starfire would occasionally keep her company but when she politely declined enough invitations to other activities they started to find better things to do. Mostly she saw Robin and Cyborg, though they rarely ever spoke.

She felt isolated. She was in the tower, yes, but she wasn't really an actual part of the Titans and the more she considered it, the more she assumed it was the for the best. She occasionally heard the others talking after they returned from one job or another and she was fairly certain she could not have helped them had she been out on the field anyway. Often times they would have a dinner together to celebrate. It was mostly take-out and they were always willing to invite her along but she never felt right about accepting.

Every day she asked herself why she was there. It took her a while, but she eventually screwed up the courage to actually ask. She figured Robin would have the answer since he was the leader. She waited until it was just the two of them in the gym when she cornered him to ask.

"Well..." He looked slightly awkward behind the mask. "The truth is... you're here because..." Her lips tightened with impatience. At least he's answering you, stupid, she thought to herself and tried to relax her expression. Robin plowed on in a rush, "We really don't know what to do with you."

Her eyes widened in surprise. She had figured they had some reason for her to stay and this was disappointing, to say the least. Robin watched her in silence and she imagined he must have pity in his eyes behind the mask. She bit her bottom lip, and thought furiously for a reply.

"I don't really know why I'm here, either." Her ears were flattened and her expression a bad attempt at blankness. "Probably because I begged."

Robin cringed visibly and shrugged, "Well, we're not really sure you should come along on any of our calls, you know? You've been working so hard, but you just don't seem ready yet."

It wasn't like she could deny it. She was constantly outstripped in everything she tried to do. Months of training and she was still just average. Healthy, yes, fit, sure, but average in almost every way. Her changes had all been cosmetic. She couldn't help but curse the man who made the changes. How dare he be so incompetent?

She nodded mutely to Robin and turned to go to her room. It was as sparse as the day she had first arrived. Not that they hadn't tried to make it nice for her, because they had. She just didn't belong and the strangeness of the room only drove the feeling home. Nicole realized she hadn't done a single thing to make the room appear lived in. The only thing that indicated it was even inhabited was the fact that the bed was unmade. She packed her bag with her meger belongings, shoved a hat over her ridiculous ears and attempted to leave without bumping into anyone.

It didn't work. Raven was sitting in the common room with a book in her lap. Nicole hesitated, wondering if she should attempt to say something to explain her leaving. When Raven made no move to acknowledge her existence Nicole shrugged and stepped out to do what she should have done in the first place.

* * *

Life in the real world wasn't as hard as Nicole had expected. It wasn't easy, granted, it particularly sucked in the beginning before she had found a job to pay rent with, but once she discovered her own little nitch things seemed to be going smoother.

She eventually found a job stocking shelves at a grocery store and saved up enough for a down payment and one months rent. After that things seemed to fall into place. She watched tv, sometimes, and spent most of her time indoors with the exception of the occasional run.

She discovered that if she wore hats, gloves, makeup, and some ugly glasses she had rigged to actually sit on her head without the aid of proper ears she could blend in better than she had anticipated. Most people were too polite to point out her strange shaped nose and if they asked about the gloves she just described the most horrifying skin condition she could find on Wikipedia. She didn't have a whole lot of friends, but her coworkers were not bad people and her neighbors kept to themselves.

Rather than let herself go completely to pot she decided to attempt to keep up the exercise. She would run every night and found that it wasn't nearly as awful when she wasn't forcing herself to it just to prove her worth.

It was no business of anyone else's if she fantasized about beating up the villian of the week and it was especially nobody's business if she thought wistfully of the victory dinners afterward that she had witnessed so often but never felt right in joining.

* * *

The breakout had been inevitable. She had heard about it watching the news one night. Several of the insane prisoners of Arkham had escaped the night before, and one of the names was entirely too familiar. It sent fear racing down her spine and she immediately turned the television off.

Over the course of the week she convinced herself that she was safe. There was no reason the mad doctor would try to find her, and she was in a completely different city now, as well. The mediocrity of her life eventually enveloped her again and she let herself forget about the potential danger.

That was why she was so surprised one night as she was walking home from work. She barely had time to struggle before the cloriform knocked her out completely.

* * *

Nicole awoke as a captive in a cell. She spent a good long while hyperventilating until she started to get too light headed. She concentrated on breathing while her mind raced useless circles around itself. She was trapped, again, in a place just like the one that had started the whole mess to begin with. She heard the bastard responcible for it all outside the door to her cell and her stomach did a nasty flop.

She was in no way ready when the doctor opened the door to greet her for the first time in nearly a year. He laughed nastily and she cowered in the corner. She was hyperventilating again and couldn't seem to control her own breathing. Her over sized ears were filled with a rushing noise and the edges of her vision were black as ink. Her claws were extended, but they wouldn't do her a bit of good because she had taken to filing the points down to harmless nubs after scratching herself too many times on accident. When he picked her up by the back of her shirt she was already crying.

There was a loud crash from the other side of the room and Nicole felt herself be dropped onto the floor of her prison. She was so surprised she had stopped hyperventilating and merely stared as the Titans dispached of her captor with relative ease. It was the first time she had been able to see them at work and it left her breathless. Absentmindedly she rubbed tears out of her eyes to see better.

The action was over fairly quickly and it all caught up to her, then. They had come to save her. Even though she knew that they would have saved anybody in such a position... it didn't matter. This time, they had come to save her.

The Titans watched with mixed reactions as Nicole dissolved into a mess of tears and gratitude. Raven arched a brow as Starfire rushed forward to try to console the sobbing girl.

The rest of the team made sure that nobody else had been trapped, but Nicole was oblivious to it all. She sobbed into Starfire's shoulder, repeating her gratitude in an incomprehensible babble until Starfire was forced to hold her at an arms length to attempt to get her attention.

"Friend Nicole, of course we would save you!" Starfire gave her a sweet smile and patted her on the head.

Nicole gave her a watery smile in return, but burst into tears all over again when Robin asked her to join them for dinner to celebrate to doctors recapture.

* * *

I have a terrible soft spot for this story. Thanks for reading!


End file.
